Huston Street, left, seen celebrating a victory July 25 with teammate Albert Pujols, has not given up a run in nine appearances for the Angels. (Chris Carlson/The Associated Press)

It was Sept. 30, and the San Diego Padres had completed their 2013 season a day earlier.

James Street died suddenly of a heart attack. It floored his son, then-Padres and current Angels closer Huston Street.

“I found out the 1st (of October), it was 3 a.m. in the morning,” Street said last week as he sat in the Angels’ dugout. “It’s the worst thing in the world.”

James Street was just 65. He was a college football and baseball star at University of Texas. A wishbone quarterback, he helped the Longhorns to a 21-17 victory over Notre Dame in the 1970 Cotton Bowl classic that earned Texas a national championship. James Street guided his team on a game-winning 76-yard drive that included a key fourth-down pass completion.

He was that kind of player.

His son is that kind of closer.

“I would say completely,” said Street, when asked how much his father rubbed off on him. “He is my hero, he was the person I was closest with. He had a view of life and the process of athletics. But more important, he defined winning as being the best that you can be. And he’d say, ‘The good ones learn from their mistakes, but the great ones learn from other people’s mistakes.’

“He talked about time and efficiency. He was very much about the process, you know, talking about pressure and what is pressure. How he believed pressure was a choice, how it was what your choice to focus on it and you could control everything. I learned all of that from him and, thankfully, at very young ages. He was not someone who babied us boys.”

One of five sons, Street has remained one of the best closers in the game. Since 2011, his save ratio of 93 percent (115 of 123) is best for pitchers with a minimum 50 chances. Since coming to the Angels from the Padres on July 18, he has been successful in all six of his save opportunities and has not given up a run in nine appearances overall. He had 24 saves for San Diego this season for a total of 30 (in 31 chances), and his combined ERA is a microscopic 0.86 — best of any closer.

“It means a lot,” Street said of being statistically the best closer in baseball since 2011; he has 264 career saves. “I think that’s something that I pride myself on is consistency. ... My belief has always been that being a good pitcher at the big-league level is getting outs consistently. More than anything, I think it’s a testament to how hard I’ve worked.”

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Hank Conger, one of two Angels catchers, gladly gave up his No. 16 uniform number to Street, whose father wore that number. He said he has been impressed with the way Street goes about preparing for a game.

“He’s like one of the first guys you see,” Conger said of Street, who said he often gets to 7:05 p.m. home games at 12:30 p.m. “He’s always getting work done or lifting or doing arm exercises. You rarely see him over there kind of just sitting around.

“Especially the young guys on the team seeing what he does and what he goes through on a daily basis, it really has become like that leadership role as far as leading by example.”

Angels manager Mike Scioscia echoes that sentiment.

“I think he understands pitching late in the game and making your pitches and being able to repeat it, and as other players watch that, I think there’s a sense of confidence that not only he’s going to get it done, but the (other) guy coming in — if he has that same mind-set — is going to perform better.”

Street does understand pitching late in a game. His motto reflects that.

“If I have a three-run lead and I give up two runs, I did my job,” he said. “If I’ve got a 3-run lead, I’m going to pitch accordingly. If I have a one-run lead, I’m going to pitch accordingly. I think that’s where I’ve gotten better as a closer, is I’ve really learned how to get the save, as opposed to pitching for the strikeout or pitching for the zero.

“It’s more of a team approach to, ‘Let’s walk off the field with a save and a team win.’ Everybody goes home happy.”

It’s almost amazing that Street is having the 2014 season he’s having, being that he had to go into spring training less than six months after losing his father at a rather young age. But he knows where the appreciation should go.

“I have to give a lot of credit and probably most of the credit to my wife (Lacey),” said Street, 31. “She put up with the bulk of my stress, my distress, my denial, my emotional battle. And then also to my mom (Janie). My mom was going through it exactly the same as I was, times about a hundred because she was his best friend, his spouse.

“She knew him far better than I did on so many more levels and I’m really thankful for their efforts because I know left to myself, I know the struggles that I had with it. It wasn’t easy. And I didn’t just breeze right through it.”

It indeed took a while.

“It was about a six-month process where I felt like I had gone through all the stages of shock, denial, anger, acceptance,” Street said. “Now I’m kind of living with joy and living with the understanding that I was very lucky to have him, that I’m a very lucky person and my life is absolutely blessed.

“I never once was going to use it as an excuse. It motivated me on a number of levels.”

When Angels general manager Jerry Dipoto traded for Street, he said Street was a high-character guy, which is always good for the clubhouse.

Listening to Street talk about his father, it seems Dipoto was right.

“He took very seriously the idea that there is no such thing as excuses and every single day you’re either getting better or you’re getting worse, you don’t stay the same,” Street said. “And I think it was that singular idea that has driven me to be a better baseball player, a better father, husband, a better friend, a better person.”